Plans for long-term improvements to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital car park, including the possibility of a multi-story, go on show to staff and visitors next week.

The four proposals will be on display in the King's Lynn hospital's reception on Monday with staff from the NHS foundation trust's estates team on hand to answer questions.

Staff from the QEH have already met with officials from the borough and county councils this week to outline the plans.

A hospital spokesman said: 'Once an option is agreed and the trust applies for planning permission, the approval and tendering process, followed by the construction programme, means that the earliest we would have our new-look car park would be in mid-2014.

'Council officials have made it clear they expect us to tidy up our current ad-hoc parking system and develop the trust's travel plan before any new proposals are considered.

'This would mean improving take-up rates for car-sharing, cycling to work or using public transport where possible.

'We will also have to find alternative parking spaces for the 400 or so cars currently parked in 'unauthorised' areas, for example on grass verges and site roads.

'Add to this the 200 spaces we will lose if the wind turbine project goes ahead and planners have a considerable challenge to resolve before we even begin to increase the number of spaces on site. 'So far 81 new spaces have been created in the car park. In addition planning permission has been granted to re-surface the old tennis courts area and make 20 further spaces available.

'Plans may also be considered to improve bus access to the site, including creation of a bus-only exit to avoid rush-hour problems in leaving the site.'

Another proposal is to create a new site entrance and exit on the A149 bypass, allowing access to Knights Hill-bound traffic coming onto the site and traffic leaving the site to turn left only, going up to Knights Hill.

'In the main car park itself there are alternative proposals, including a new-build steel frame multi-storey of four levels or a single-level deck across much of the lower car park area,' the spokesman continued.

'Construction options will be expensive - a multi-storey for 600 cars would be a minimum of �5 million, for example - so our board will be taking affordability into account when weighing-up the options.

'A number of finance possibilities are also available, including specialist construction companies financing, designing, maintaining and operating the car park, which will avoid impacting on patient healthcare costs.'

The exhibition on Monday will run from 9am until 5pm. Further public consultation meetings will be held in the New Year. People can also give their views via carparking@qehkl.nhs.uk.